On July 13, 2024, a deranged gunman attempted to assassinate former President Donald Trump. Although the would-be assassin was shot and killed by the Secret Service’s Counter Sniper Team, he was still able to murder a 50-year-old man Corey Comperatore and would wound two other individuals. 

From there, supporters of Trump and other Republicans quickly pounced on this incident to point out that Democrats’ and the corporate media’s hysterical rhetoric has created the environment for a lunatic to rise up and try to assassinate the former president. 

One thing of note was how X users quickly pointed out that Mississippi Congressman Bennie Thompson, the leader of the now-defunct January 6 Select Committee, previously put forward legislation that would strip Trump of Secret Service protection simply for the fact that he is a convicted felon.  

However, X/Twitter users were quick to point out that the Mississippi Democrat, who was the leader of then-Speaker Pelosi’s (D-CA) now-defunct January 6 Select Committee, introduced legislation in April to take away Trump’s Secret Service protection upon a conviction.

Donald Trump Jr. responded to his father’s assassination attempt writing on Twitter, “Remember, if @BennieGThompson and the Democrats got their way, my dad would be dead right now.”

“Don’t let them memory hole it,” Trump Jr. continued. 

In a similar vein, Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene declared that the co-sponsors of this legislation “wanted this to happen.” Thankfully, this bill died in the Republican-controlled House. 

Other Republicans pushed sitting President Joe Biden to lower the temperature of political discussions. “We’ve got to take the political temperature down,” Utah Senator Mike Lee declared in a statement, calling on Biden to “immediately order that all federal criminal charges against President Trump be dropped, and to ask the governors of New York and Georgia to do the same.”

“Today is not just some isolated incident,” then-Ohio Senator, now Vice President candidate J.D. Vance posted on X. “The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.”

A point of no return has been reached in US politics. There’s no going back to normalcy. One can only expect further acts of violence and broader scale institutional breakdown to occur in the American political process. 

Buckle up. Because things are only going to get wilder from here on out.